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Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Art is an interesting thing, because we find the need to compartmetalize everything. This band is death metal. That one is in country.

That's a Western band, but it ends up getting all crazy and silly when it becomes entirely too specific.

In the introduction email I received from Labors, they told me that they're a band that plays Midwestern Americana. Now, I'm not making fun of the label they chose.

Like many bands in our modern world, what's old has become new and what's new has become old, and what's brand new is what happens if when you combine the old and the new and get this new kind of pudding....with Snickers in it.

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Metallica is metal. Rifftera likes to riff. Deicide is decidedly anti-religious. KISS is...well I don't know about that one.

So, let's try a new tact here at Glacially Musical.

I'm going to interpret the name of the band and the cover photo and see how accurate I am with just guessing at things.

Protovulcan.

Proto, we all know this well known prefix. It's the first one. Sometimes used to refer the one that came before the one you use now. OK.

Vulcan...now...wait. Vulcan like Mr. Spock or Vulcan like Hephaestus?! Thinking a little more, it couldn't be like Mr. Spock, as he was not a prototypical vulcan, but half human, and proto could be something else too... OK I got nothin'.

It creates an interesting symbolism, at least in my mind. It certainly made me take notice of him.

But all in all, the artist's name is seemingly meaningless, and I mean "the artist" in the general sense. I mean, Kiss isn't exactly a great name and Megadeth isn't even spelled right, or even a word....

Friday, September 25, 2015

Just hearing the name of a metal sub-genre, like Doom Metal, will immediately open all sorts of locked doors in my mind.

I will then begin to reminisce over several different times in my life. Like once talking about Black Sabbath on the side of a small pond fishing, and how we decided they were more Acid Rock than Heavy Metal.

You have to remember that this was before the factioning of heavy metal. During these days, it was just heavy metal. Thrash Metal existed of course, but it hadn't made it into the lexicon yet.

Today's reviewee is Grim Van Doom all the way from Germany. As our friend and spiritual leader, Bender B. Rodriguez would say, Grim Van Doom transcends genres as they reinvent them.

Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Am I the only one that has a hard time not stereotyping music from Scandinavia?

Perhaps I've watched too much "Metalocalypse," or maybe I've attended too many Iron Maiden concerts, but when I think of that area of the world, I picture five very blonde, very bearded young men huddled around more Marshall stacks than one can count.

Of course this isn't remotely true, but just my interpretation.

Level & Tyson....they are nothing even remotely similar to what I just described, except that they have about the right number of people to make that happen.

They are part of the fuzz rock revolution. I can remember a time when no one remembered what fuzz tones even were, but here nowadays, it's come back and on purpose, unlike many of the fuzzy instigators like Buddy Guy who just happened to achieve the sound....

Monday, September 14, 2015

I can't stop thinking of Hot Daddy and the Monkey Puppets. You know that band Uncle Jesse had in the latter seasons of Full House?

I remember that instead of playing guitar and singing, he played drums and sang, but did it standing up...

Oh the hilarity that ensued. Those classic sitcom moments like when they had to play polka instead of rock'n'roll, and who could save the day, but the young man who was fired from the band that same day...ahh.

Thankfully, Archi Deep & The Monkeyshakers are not a cover band from some awful sitcom from my youth that I cannot get out of my brain. They're a real band from France.

Friday, September 11, 2015

I recently made the point that I don't care if people do or don't know the artists I enjoy, but being as I listen to so many different artists along such a wide spectrum, it's pretty easy for me to say that don't you think?

As for today, I'm listening to the new release by Stellar Master Elite all the way from The Rhineland in Germany.

They have been at the music game since 2010. Obviously we are considering their third album.

The first two albums were released in 2011 and 2013. That puts these Germans on a good two year cycle between albums. They're listed as Death/Black Metal, but I wonder if that's the same as Blackened Death Metal?

Tuesday, September 8, 2015

I received an email that simply said he needed an address to send off a review copy of his upcoming album.

OK.

That's all I knew really. It could have been anything. The title is Crucible, which is very metal. It's the type of pot they used to burn witches in and the name of an old thrash metal band from St. Louis whose indie cassette tape I recently found in an old box of stuff.

Well, Drew Worthley is not metal in the slightest.

The East Londoner plays well, a sort of retro pop made new again. I will get more into that as we go on. He's on the cusp of releasing his second album independently and was good though to think of me

Monday, September 7, 2015

The first two albums never really struck me very hard. Their debut was good enough, but their sophomore record doubled down on some of the aesthetic elements of the band I found to be a bit distasteful, shall we say.

Huntress has been billed as the next King Diamond or Mercyful Fate.

That's a very good thing because we need a new one. The King is getting up there in years and needs an Heir Apparent.

Unfortunately, they had not lived up to that title in their previous efforts. All of the ingredients were there, but something was always missing....

Wednesday, September 2, 2015

I can't get that line out from Huck Finn out of my head when I think of this man's name.

I mean, I'm sure that Barlow is a perfectly normal family name and can be traced back generations all the way to Europe, but to me, I'm just reminded of that vagrant hero, written by Mark Twain.

Missouri's own by the way....

As I can't even think of this man as whom he is when I hear his name, it's most likely quite clear that I'm not familiar with his body of work, but if I'm honest, the cover did intrigue me a bit. Ah...he's from Dinosaur Jr.

Tuesday, September 1, 2015

Being the author of a non-specific music blog who answers to no one means that you can just write about whatever crosses your desk that you find interesting.

I've been trying to shuffle around what I do here in order to have a wider array of music and I've there have been some very cool things to come our way.

Today we're going back to Finland. It seems that about half of what crosses my desk these days is Scandinavian.

Interesting how that has come to be.

Meet Dark Buddha Rising. They're from Finland, obviously. They've been at this for a little while, but they still seem quite mysterious...see photo. They're about to release their fifth album of progressive psychedelic doom....we're just going to call it prog.